NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #27/NN_1992_27.iso/spool/alt/usage/english/8667

Text File | 1992-11-19 | 14.3 KB | 316 lines

Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
Path: sparky!uunet!wupost!darwin.sura.net!jvnc.net!princeton!crux!roger
From: [e-mail] (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: quite unique
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Reply-To: [e-mail] (Roger Lustig)
Organization: Princeton University
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Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 03:32:47 GMT
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In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Chris Malcolm) writes:
>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Roger Lustig) writes:
>>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Chris Malcolm) writes:
>>>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Roger Lustig) writes:

>>>>I say that a word means what LOTS OF PEOPLE say it means -- namely those
>>>>who use it.  I say that there is no other standard for determining meaning
>>>>of words.

>>>A person is free to form their own judgement, to approve or disapprove
>>>of some new trend in usage, or even to suggest a new coinage (such as
>>>"hir"). If their arguments & publicity work, then in time they may
>>>influence enough language users for their view to become first an
>>>accepted usage, and ultimately perhaps even the proper usage.

>>Of course, the vast majority of coinages and usage changes occur without
>>any publicity at all.

>I meant publicity in the most general sense, i.e., including public
>usage, such as by the media, some of which are regarded as holding to
>an approved standard of good usage.

Of course, the vast majority of coinages and usage changes occur without
any publicity at all, including that sense.  Somebody feels the need for
a new word or uses an old word in a new way.  Other people pick up the usage
and spread it.  Perhaps it's heard on the radio or used in the newspaper;
it can be years before one of the "approved standard" media notices it, by
which time it may have run its course and disappeared, or become firmly
entrenched in some set of dialects.

>>>It is also the duty of every language user to consider which side to
>>>take on any developing usage -- to condone or condemn.

>>Why?  Surely use/don't use is the only choice the vast majority will
>>ever make; and this choice has driven every language change in human
>>history.  Most people can't be bothered to look at the thousands of
>>new coinages and meanings that pop up each week, not that the
>>newspapers print lists of them or anything.

>I meant simply that a language user, when reading or hearing some
>novel usage, will choose whether or not to adopt it. I was
>recommending that this choice be made on linguistic grounds, rather
>than, for example, that it was observed in the speech or writing of a
>high status person.

Either way would require a *conscious* choice.  I've never seen any
evidence that people learn new words thatway most of the time, or make
their usage choices that way, any more than a child learning its first
language makes a set of notecards as it goes along.

>[if enough]
>>>language users care enough about the language this should result in
>>>improvements.

>>How?  What kind of improvements?

>The specialisation of originally synonymous terms to express finer
>distinctions, or to remove ambiguity, for example. An instance of this
>is the British adoption of the US spelling "program" to designate a
>computer program, and the specialisation of "programme" for such cases
>as "programme of research". u

Are the Brits demonstrably better off for having created this distinction?
You can use the US as a control--we spell both words the same.  I don't recall
ever getting confused, so I doubt I'd pay much to implement that distinction.

The distinction certainly didn't come about *because* there was confusion.
It came about because there were thousands of American books and papers
on computers.

>Another improvement is the adoption in
>Britain of the US meaning of "billion", rather than fostering
>ambiguity by continuing to fight a losing battle in favour of the
>British "billion".

An interesting case: ambiguity due to *too many* words.  This is indeed a
conscious change, but it certainly doesn't involve adoption of a new
word or meaning -- just the appropriation of somebody else's meaning
due to hegemony or the like.   (No, you can't have the bridge back.  8-) )

>>>If too many language users are simply sheep who
>>>thoughtlessly propagate every fresh mistake and confusion, then the

>>Can you show me that there exists one such person on the planet?

>There are plenty of posters to this net who have supported novel
>usages which add no extra capability to the language (being synonymous
>with and no more economical than existing expressions), and which

That doesn't make them sheep.  Moreover, words have other attributes
than economy: they can be colorful, they can allude to other words,
they can remove ambiguity.  Take "pro-active" for example.  Somebody
claimed that this was no improvement on "active," and longer besides.
But it contains *several* new distinctions--it tells us what its
antonym is, for one thing.  (Active has at least three: passive, inactive,
reactive.)  Pro-active has a double antonym: reactive plus inactive.  If
one is pro-active one is neither of these.)  The added syllable also
contains implications of movement toward a goal, and of virtue.

Or was this not one of your examples?  If not, I'd like to hear about
some of these coinages that were created for no reason.  I've never
encountered one.

>detract from the expressive capacity of the language by introducing
>ambiguity,

Examples?  I've never encountered a new word or meaning that diminished
the language.  Words fall out of fashion as often as they fall into fashion.
Neither process hurts our language, which is certainly as capable of
subtle expression today as it ever was.

>and whose support consists of no more than "other people do
>it so why shouldn't I?"

Well? Why shouldn't they?  That's the justification for using the
language in the first place, and for using every word in it.  Because
other people speak it, because other people use those words.

>The confusion of "infer" and "imply" into
>synonyms has recently been defended on just these grounds. That's what
>I mean by "sheep" in this context.

So, can we no longer express ourselves? Is there really a lot of
ambiguity due to this "confusion"?  Have oyou encountered a sentence
in which the speaker/writer's meaning was truly unclear?  Where it
was not obvious from the context?

>>(Note that the above sentence implies that most people are actually
>>sheep when it comes to language, because most of them don't think
>>about issues of neologism and redefinition.  Why am *I* the only
>>one who gets accused of being rude, when things like this are
>>basically insults that cover about 99% of the world's population?)

>It wouldn't surprise me if 99% of your friends are "sheep" in this
>sense, and it may even be true of 99% of the English-speaking
>population of the US, but it is certainly not true of non-US English
>speakers. Indeed, one of the things which often surprises British
>English speakers is how commonplace this "anything goes" attitude is
>in the US.

A centuries-old prejudice.  IN the 19th C, every neologism
that some writer didn't like
was written off on the Americans, whether there was factual
basis for this assertion or not.   Perusal of the more recent supplements
to the OED will showthat language coinage takes
place about as fast in the British Isles as it does here.

(Of course, I've also heard Brits wondering about the insecurity Americans
have about their language and the constant worries and punditry
over this word or that.)

No, sorry.  Consult a trained linguist in your country and find
out about language change.  People all around the world pick up their
new words by the same process: using them.

And all your insults and mnational prejudice won't change that.

>I am sure that if you walked into any Irish pub, for
>example, you would find many English speakers who would argue all
>night about issues of this kind,

As opposed to what issues that they *wouldn't* argue???  8-)

Seriously, we have regular newspaper columns on these issues.  And
there's enough interest and insecurity on the matter that twits like
Edwin Newman and John Simon sell lots of their misinformed books.

>and few who would disagree with such concern.

And what of their actual practice of language?  Do they really copnsider
each new word before they use it, and put it to some logical or
pracitcal tests, or do they simply do what the rest of the world
does, and then go to the pub and talk a good game?

>>>language will degenerate.

>>Ah, here we go.  Funny, but this argument has been made in every century
>>that there's *been* an English language, and especially the last four.
>>Swift was absolutely sure that English was going to the dogs ...
>>yet we can read his prose without trouble or dictionaries.

>Not true. Swift is often used, and has often been used, in Englih
>language comprehension tests, and the proportion of today's British
>schoolchildren who can understand it is definitely less than a few
>decades ago.

Is this due to language change?  (Hint: unlikely.)  Probably has
to do with the educational system (sorry to hear you're having the
same problems we are) and the economic upheavals of the last generation.

I was actually referring to a specific essay that Swift wrote about
the alarming rate of neologism in his time.  He was convinced that *that
essay* would be incomprehensible to all but a few initiates with huge
dictionaries after two centuries had gone by.  The essay is as easy to read
as it was then, needless to say.

>>Johnson
>>felt the same way, and planned to write a Dictionary to "fix" the
>>language to the usage of that time.  (Writing it cured him of this
>>folly, btw.)

>I challenge you to cite a history of the English language which does
>not think that the efforts of Johnson have had a considerable
>influence.

How could a magisterial work such as the Dictionary have been other than
wonderfully influential!  Mind you, I don't understand the point of
your challenge: I wouldn't dream of disagreeing with you.  I merely
pointed out that Johnson's actual work in philology, which followed the
Plan for a Dctionary (1745), changed his attitude dramatically.

>Most, for example, blame Johnson and his ilk for the silly
>"don't split infinitives" rule which still bedevils English -- and
>discussions on this group.

I hadn't heard that one before.  Do you have a citation?  In any case,
Fitzedward Hall (Am. Jour. Philol. iii) gives examples of the split
infinitive in Johnson's prose...

>>And on and on; most people feel that English has been declining since
>>their schooldays.

>In the UK they seem to be right. Most educational researchers agree
>that both the used and comprehended vocabularies of teenage UK
>schoolchildren is less, and their ability to understand and use
>complex sentences poorer, than it was in the time of their parents.

What has this to do with the state of the language?  That sounds more like
an indictment of the schools.  Or perhaps of TV.

>>Yet it doesn't seem to do so.  English is a wonderfully vital language
>>that has never yet been damaged by all kinds of neologism, redefinition,
>>etc.  In fact, for a Golden Age of making up words, try Shakespeare's time.

>I have nothing at all against neologisms. I welcome them if they
>improve the language.

Again: show me one that damages it.  Are you telling me that *neologism*
is what's ruined the education of today's young?  And I thought ganja
was bad for your attitude...

>>Fortunately, purism wasn't popular at the time;'
>>people didn't complain as much about these new words, and didn't spend
>>their days taking moral stands on which word to use.

>I am not a purist nor a conservative. I am simply against new usages
>which add nothing to the language, and often subtract.

I'd still like an example.  But remember, every generation has those who
will argue that each new word is damaging and useless and not as good
as some other word already in use.  Yet many of those words become fixtures
in the language, by and by, and the language is never any worse off.
I give you: greed, donate, mob, communication, banter, reliable.  All
the target of arguments about "unnecessary" and "subtracts from the
language."  All the source of much horror and despair about declining
standards.

And it's been going on for centuries.  If those folks were right, none
of us would be doing anything but waving our arms and babbling.

>And you are
>quite wrong about people not taking stands on linguistic grounds in
>those days. Shakespeare was no isolated linguistic giant. Not only
>were there many well-educated word-coiners at work in the literary
>arena of his time, the common people of the time were capable of
>understanding much more complex language than they are today, and the

Evidence for this?  Most of the common people couldn't read.  A large
portion of them never left their village or town, and never heard
complex language in the first place.

>arts of story-telling, repartee, witticism, and general word-play were
>much more widespread, and of a much higher standard, among ordinary
>people, than they are today.

Again, I'd like to see some evidence for this aspect of Merrie England.
The wordplay in Shakespeare is *not* evidence; his audience included
many who did not expect to get this or that passage.

>The modern Irish "gift of the gab" is a
>archaic survival from times of much greater linguistic skills in the
>common people.

So, how large was the vocabulary of the typical 16thC Irish peasant?

>>> ... sheep who suppose that any usage employed by some people somewhere
>>>is by that fact alone justified as a usage which cannot be criticised.

>>Excuse me, but do you know anyone who fits the latter category?

>Not personally, but I do see them posting to this newsgroup. That's
>why I started this argument.

If you ever see another such posting, forward it to me.  At the same time,
explain to me how people who take an interest in language to the extent of
arguing the acceptability of a word qualify as sheep.  They are, after
all, expending far more conscious effort on language than do most people.

Roger